Practice Areas + Services
With awareness building at the core of our engagements, ThirdSpace’s work falls into four categories: re-designing philanthropy, promoting economic inclusion, creating artistic and physical spaces to foster belonging, and public policy movement building. Here are snapshots of projects with past and present clients:
Re-Designing Philanthropy
Engaging a prominent community foundation to reconsider its role in driving systemic change: committing to move beyond a culture of representation, internalizing the lessons of COVID-19, increasing cross-departmental transparency + collaboration, and making the most of an upcoming, high-stakes investment.
Co-designing racial justice objectives with a place-based family foundation to build long-term capacity in BIPOC-led nonprofits, leverage its influence to hold white-led organizations accountable to equity metrics, reconsider its role as an organizer in philanthropic circles, and invest in a narrative change strategy to ensure the racial justice imperative remains on its region’s agenda.
Coaching a coalition of environmental philanthropists through power-mapping in their ecosystem and creating an action plan for activating persuadable partners to create measurable racial equity goals.
Promoting Economic Inclusion
Developing a new strategic plan for an influential community development corporation, building on years of community collaboration to rethink real estate development + small-business growth in a rapidly changing neighborhood.
Catalyzing a Michigan-focused workforce funders collaborative focus on creating quality jobs for low- to moderate-income Black workers.
Inspiring a global venture capital network to recognize the racialized power dynamics hampering its ability to retain staff, attract founder-entrepreneurs, and grow innovative companies.
Creating Artistic + PHysical Spaces to Foster belonging
Co-creating a multi-site exhibit with an Ohio contemporary art museum to spotlight the theme of Black pathways to self-determination and collective liberation.
Advising a creative design agency on a public art project about Black history intended to inspire discussions of racial equity, social justice, and civic engagement.
Discovering opportunities for a 90-year-old park to include the surrounding community in its plans to expand access to green spaces.
Public Policy Movement Building
Convening + facilitating learning groups of public servants in six American cities (Albuquerque, Austin, Memphis, Minneapolis, St. Paul, and Rochester) working to advance racial equity through homeownership, entrepreneurship, and local government reforms.
Encouraging philanthropic partners to become funder-organizers and creating metrics to move them toward advocacy on root-cause policy issues they currently treat symptoms of through grantmaking.
Writing + speaking on numerous policy issues through a racial equity lens + systems-change lens, including: police accountability, local government leadership, equitable recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic, the impact of the 2020 Uprising on American cities, public financing of sport stadiums, and building anti-racist civic ecosystems.
